


Of Authors, Books and Fuinjutsu

by Hermionechan90



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling, Naruto
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-01-08
Updated: 2014-01-09
Packaged: 2018-01-08 00:38:26
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 8
Words: 19,323
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1126300
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Hermionechan90/pseuds/Hermionechan90
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>After the war a bitter and disillusioned Hermione decides to move to the pocket dimension called Elemental countries. Watch how certain Konoha shinobi change the course of her life.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**England**

Great Britain. What a loaded word, home of 60 million non magical people, ruled by a queen, loved by the majority of its residents and absolutely abhorred by one Hermione Granger.

That hadn’t been always so, Hermione’s disgust wasn’t for the land or even for the bad weather, no she hated the isles for its magical community. The British wizarding community had learned absolutely NOTHING of the last war. The war that had cost Hermione her closest friends and family and had left the young witch devastated, bitter and alone.   
In the end it only took four months and five days for the magical community to go back to their old ways of slander, bigotry and embezzlement. Their favorite phrase ‘Why fix it when it’s not broken?’ was being whispered through the halls of the British Ministry of Magic once more.   
But it was broken; there was no way around it! The fundamental legislation of the British Wizarding world that should guarantee the protection and rightful punishment of its citizens was partially shattered under the feet of the sheep and the few parts that weren’t, were so damnable twisted that the so called law suppressed the rights of the innocent while those that were rich enough to buy themselves out of trouble stayed in power and remained blameless.

The moment Hermione had realized this she had made up her mind; she would leave this all behind and never look back.

The brown haired witch just couldn’t take it anymore. She was tried, frustrated and bitter, furthermore she was still reeling from the losses she had suffered in the last year and so she just didn’t have the strength to fight against the bigotry and outrageous corruption and frankly she didn’t want to. Should somebody else deal with their next Dark Lord because without a doubt there would be another and after that another until finally somebody fixed this damn system or the whole community was left in shambles of their own stupidity.

**Elemental Nations**

The first time Hermione had read about the Elemental Nations was during her research for Harry’s first task during the Triwizard Tournament. The book that contained this particular fascinating topic was called ‘ _Shield magic and what can go wrong’_ and had mesmerized Hermione for a whole weekend until Harry had come pale faced to her with the news that he was fighting _dragons_ in the first Task!

In between the first and the second Task Hermione had then found some time to do a bit personal research for her own pleasure. She had been rather irritated that her ‘me’ time in the library had been disrupted by Victor Krum’s visits but had stubbornly ignored the giggling fangirls to devote her attention to the fascinating topic of the Elemental Nations.  
The Elemental Nations were essentially a pocket dimension, a copy of Earth that had been fitted in between time and space and was only accessible through a tightly secured entrance in the Tokyo region. It was cited as THE most prominent still existing but failed artificial dimension creation since the creation of Atlantis.   
Hermione had been absolutely fascinated about this astonishing magical project that was baffling experts around the globe even today and had ordered several books from other libraries all over Britain through Madame Pince. The stern librarian had been very hard to convince to order said books, apparently there were some very valuable tombs under them but in the end had acquiesced. Though even Hermione hadn’t been allowed to move them around Hogwarts, instead the librarian had enchanted an adjourning room to hold said books and in said room Hermione had spent nearly all her free time until Pince had to send said books back. There were a lot of different opinions about this topic and it took a while for Hermione to wade through the different conclusions and theories.  
In the end Hermione was relative sure to have at least a relative good grasp on the topic.  
The Japanese pocket dimension was rumored to be the most extensive work of rune magic ever created. The man who had designed the rune arc had studied the mistakes of the Atlantians and was smart enough to put extensive shields around the pocket dimension. They were powered by the natural magic of Earth and the Elemental countries, he so prevented the collapse of the pocket dimension as it had happened in Atlantis. The only problem was that thanks to the vast amount of natural magic that radiated from the shields the soil and vegetation inside the artificial dimension became so saturated with it that it had started to change the people and creatures inside the dimension.  
The authors of most of the books that the fifteen year old Hermione read at that time were quite disapproving of the man called Fukudo Ichirou. The Japanese born warlock and Rune Master was considered to be one of the most brilliant minds of his time, during his later years his numerous achievements earned him the honorary title of Rikudo Sennin, the Sage of the Six Paths.  
Ichirou had led nearly fifteen hundred people in his pocket dimension during a time of unrest and war in Japan. Approximately five hundred of them had been wizards and witches and consequently the magic inside the dimension slowly started to change and adapt their physical make up, nature magic after all was known to have a mind of its own. As a result the magical humans lost their ability to use a focus while unknowingly to them their cores grew, the muggles on the other hand received more visible gifts, they gained a stronger immune system as well as developed inhuman strength and speed. Furthermore all children that had been born since the beginning of the colonisationreceived strangely vibrant hair and eye colors and in some cases even colored and oddly shaped birth marks.  
Because of the loss of their powers the former wizards and witches instigated a civil war between themselves and it was during that time that the ninja and samurai clans started to develop in full; protection and assassins were in high demand.   
It took Ichirou nearly fifteen years to unlock his changed magic and abilities and make use of it. To differentiate it from the old magic still existing on Earth the former warlock called the power Chakra, it was essentially a mixture of both spiritual and physical energy that was molded together and could be discharged through various points of the body.  
Because Ichirou felt it was his fault that this new land was war torn and blood was spilled everywhere, he travelled through the continent and spread his knowledge about chakra to mollify the former magic users and stop the fighting. At first it helped and the fights became fewer and fewer but within a few years some of the former wizards became greedy and wanted more and more power and when they reached the potential of their new bodies they tried to amass the power in a different way. The group of nine warlocks and witches decided to directly tap into the nature chakra just like the Rikudo Sennin had done to create the Elemental countries, only to oversee a critical fact. Fukudo Ichirou had had tattooed hundreds of different Runes all over his body to prevent his death while creating the dimension. Those Runes stopped his body from being overwhelmed by the magic and prevented him from drawing to much at one go, because magic and chakra were so closely related in the beginning, the same applied to the new discovered force.  
The nine magical users of varying strength had created a rune circle to suck chakra from the nature around it and then drew raw chakra directly into themselves. Within moments after starting the ritual they were overwhelmed by the nature chakra and their bodies and souls were twisted together until there was only one mindless beast with ten tails left. This beast rampaged through the land and destroyed everything in its way and changed the landscape of the dimension world permanently.   
Unable to find a way to kill it, Ichirou finally sealed it into his own body to prevent any further damage and in the following years through mediation and careful tests he could detangle the nine souls inside the giant chakra mass. None of the former magic users’ personality or memory had survived and even if it had the massive amount of nature chakra had dissolved their bodies completely, what had been left over was a massive chakra construct with a mindless need of destruction. To prevent said construct from attacking the people in the Elemental countries once more after Ichirou’s death, said man split the chakra construct in nine entities which surprisingly developed their own consciousness after a few days, with time Ichirou had come to see those nine as his own children.   
Before the Sage of the Sixth Paths died he hid the gateway to Earth, on the walls surrounding the Rune entrance he carved the story of his life along with a warning and of the effects the Elemental countries had on magical people.   
For a long time travelling into the Elemental countries had been forbidden, the magical communities had feared that the transformation of one’s magic could be contagious. It had taken quite some time until the various governments around the world had enough courage to explore said pocket dimension once more. They started to experiment with the effects of the dimension on magical prisoners that they had entered against their will into the Elemental countries. After decades of study they had finally concluded that it took at a minimum a year to change the magical core permanently into chakra and that a prolonged stay on Earth could reverse some the effects to a point. They still cautioned their people from entering Fukudo Ichirou’s so called failed experiment but not exactly permitted them from entering it.  
The Japanese magical government took care of the protection of the gateway and kept taps on the happenings inside of the dimension to this day, furthermore everyone that wanted to enter the Elemental countries had to be registered and put under silencing vows so that he or she couldn’t talk about the Earth and magic no matter what happened to them inside.

To be honest the Elemental countries didn’t even cross Hermione’s mind when she converted all her money and the money that she had inherited from Harry from galleons into gold, jewelry and precious gems. She had planned a world tour to take her mind of the war and after travelling a bit and experiencing new things to settle in the Muggle world and lead a quiet and unremarkable life.  
And exactly that was what she had been doing for two months until she met a Rune Master in Sweden by the name of Astrid Dalgaard. The forty something woman was sarcastic, quick minded and blunt, she badgered Hermione so long until her control broke down and the curly haired witch told her about how fucked up her live had become. The British witch poured her heart out to a total stranger that had sat down on her table on a whim.

At the end of the night Astrid said, “Shit happens, I know this doesn’t help you one bit at the moment but believe me, even if it doesn’t go away completely it will get better, though first you have to start moving on.”

Hermione cancelled her portkey on the next day and extended her stay for another week. In the end she had stayed for three and a half years to study Runes and become a Master. The brown haired witch had learned many fascinating things from her mentor. Unfortunately Astrid couldn’t help her with the original reason for staying, her mental state. The feeling of being lost didn’t go away, Hermione just learned how to repress it a bit and when the loneliness got too much, how to numb herself sufficiently to grant her tortured psyche some relief.


	2. Chapter 2

**Departure**

“And you are sure?” the Swedish woman asked, trying to conceal her worry.

“Yes, Astrid I am,…” Hermione rolled her eyes, she had been asked this time and time again, yes she was quite sure of what she wanted to do.

“I still can’t believe you, your magic will never be the same, even if you decide to come back you will be no different than a squib maybe a tad more powerful but that’s it!” the Rune Master tried to reason with her friend and student.

“I know,…” Hermione sighed while she continued to pack.

These arguments had been going on for weeks now and frankly Hermione was tired of them, yes she had considered the repercussions quite carefully but to be honest she had been playing with that particular idea for over half a year, a long time before she had even mentioned it to Astrid.

Hermione had decided that she had once more reached a point where she wanted to move on, Sweden while somewhat distracting had not held what she had been looking for and frankly she doubted that she would find her peace anywhere else on Earth, so the curly haired witch had decided to leave this world behind and explore the Elemental countries and hopefully settle there.

She had completed her mastery of Runes and while she loved her quirky master and really didn’t want to see her distressed she had already decided and was sticking to her decision. She did this to start fresh in a world where nobody knew her name or her dead friends.

And so what if it would cost her, her magic? That didn’t matter, MAGIC didn’t matter to her,… she hadn’t even used her wand in over a year.

The runes she employed could be powered through channeling her magic into her fingers and touching them. Hermione had theorized that her ability to use Runes most likely wouldn’t change in the Elemental countries thanks to the fact that chakra was so similar to magic. Concerning the rest,… cleaning, cooking and washing? Please she had grown up as a muggle, menial tasks were her smallest problem. And the occasional potion? A wand was only needed for the most complicated ones and those she would probably not need. And finally transportation,… okay so it wasn’t instant travel but she had time and a car in Sweden and for the longer distances she had no problems with using an airplane. She wasn’t sure what would happen in the Elemental Countries but she was sure that she would find her way from point A to point B somehow. So,… no, she wouldn’t miss her magic, not one bit!   
With a resolute push Hermione closed her last suitcase before downsizing it with the help of two strategically placed Runes, the minimized suitcase was casually sealed into her runic belt before the young witch turned around to her former Master.

When her eyes fell on Astrid’s glistening eyes Hermione’s gaze became softer and she felt guilty for being so cool to the other witch, “Astrid, you should know that you are very important to me but I have to do this. The world and especially MAGIC constricts me, it feels wrong and every day I have to force myself to get up only to be reminded of those I have lost in the simplest things. I want to start over, to begin anew. These three years in Sweden have helped me,… you have helped me but I have this strong urge to leave it all behind me, to go to the Elementals, to forget magic and frankly I’m done with denying my gut instinct. It has proven to be right again and again… I’m sorry that this decision will hurt you.”

Hermione sighed at the last sentence and hugged the trembling older woman with tears in her eyes. She knew it was cold to leave her mentor like that and to most likely never see her again but she was determined.   
Two hours later Hermione took her flight to Tokyo, with only hand luggage and her runic belt.

The runic belt had been of her first creations after mastering more than the basics in Runes. On the outside it was just a thick black silk belt that went around her waist with a big bronze buckle on the front that was decorated with an intricate carving pattern, the deceptive item fit in with all the other belts muggle women wore these days as an accessory but it was far from being only that.  
The small carvings on the metal were actually runes for protection, durability, anti-theft and repair. It had been quite the chore to explain to the muggle blacksmith what she wanted and how it had to be placed and frankly it hadn’t been cheap either but oh SO worth it. The first belt she had ever created had been out of brown leather and it had been okay at that time because she didn’t really need it for anything but her daily life but now that she would go into the Elementals and most likely never return? That was a whole different can of worms, Hermione simply NEEDED to make sure that the things she brought with her would be secure and at the same time easily accessible for herself.

The next check point on her list of preparations was a set of potions; Hermione was planning on entering a dimension with an Asian culture and live there for the rest of her life. She had to be able to blend in with the populace no questions asked. For that purpose she had spent a big amount of gold that Harry had bequeathed to her on a universal language potion that would enhance her ability to pick up a language pattern as well as an identity theft potion, while procuring the identity theft potion she was nearly caught by an undercover Korean auror. That was an experience that sent her blood pumping for the first time on so many years and Hermione wasn’t sure if she loved or hated that feeling.

After her arrival in Japan she took some time to check out the security that was placed around the Elemental countries entrance because she really didn’t want to be registered or placed under secrecy charms. It was laughable, there was only one wizard per shift and that person normally either slept through most of the time, read a newspaper or did something else than their duty of guarding the entrance.

After confirming the extend of the security measures a second time just to be on the safe side, Hermione spent a relaxing week in Tokyo, changing the last parts of her currency into jewels and gold along with spending it on hundreds of books, from different genres that wouldn’t be available in the Elemental Countries. Furthermore she used her time in Tokyo to pick up on the Japanese language and get used to the feeling of the language. It was a strange feeling, her Occlumency skills literally let her watch how her brain absorbed each and every word around her and filed it away until exclamations started to make sense, then basic sentences and at the end of the week Hermione had listened and participated in a discussion about ethics strangely enough.  
On a Tuesday Hermione finally felt ready to escape Earth and so she sealed all her last minute purchases into her rune belt, put on hiking boots, a durable pair of jeans as well as several different layers of shirts and sweatshirts to peal herself out of it. To the brown haired witch it was just sensible to wear clothes in which she had enough mobility to sneak around and do naughty things instead of her normal muggle clothes or Merlin forbid robes. Additionally she had Harry’s invisible cloak neatly folded up in the pocket of her jacket, the magical object of Death was in easy reach to help her slip away from this world and into another.

**New Beginnings**

To be honest the trip through the portal was disappointingly boring, no rollercoaster, no deep voice, no bright light. Instead she felt a small tingle on her skin that was even weaker than the normal floo travel experience, a soft yellow light shone during the two seconds she was neither here nor there and then Hermione was standing inside a cave with ancient Japanese writing and runes on the walls.

The curly haired woman had stared dumbly for a moment before making her way cautiously through the nearly completely round cave. A gaze behind her to the entrance to Earth made her gape, if she hadn’t known where exactly the portal to her world lay, Hermione would have certainly never found it. After another curious gaze around the nearly spherical room, the witch made her way to the side of the cave that looked a bit different from the rest and found the entrance of the cave.   
Hermione breathed in the clear summer night air and looked at the shadowed landscape before her. From far away she could see the lights of a village or town while the scant moonlight threw large shadows onto the mountain range she was standing upon, even the moon was different Hermione noted absentmindedly while she took everything in. The shadows would have intimidated and frightened her if she had been five years younger, now though the only thing she felt was soothing comfort while the dark surrounded her like a blanket. After a near endless moment the curly haired young woman vanished back into the cave entrance and out of sight of anybody who glanced up to the rock mass the cave was nestled in.  
Back in the cave Hermione felt suddenly very tired, she hadn’t slept well in the last few days her mind had been working overtime to make sure that she didn’t forget anything. So she tiredly unsealed her sleeping bag after putting up some protection runes around her sleeping area and then she drifted off to sleep at the cave entrance. The lights and consequently the village they had originated from were her last thought before she sank into Morpheus arms, she would cautiously investigate this human settlement in the morning.

**New identity**

During the first two weeks in the Elemental Countries Hermione wandered from the small village that was situated at the foot of the mountain to a slightly bigger one only two hours away. On the way Hermione noted that the whole region was pretty rangy and she had to take detours more than once when a rock slide obstructed her path.   
The moment the witch came into vicinity of the next village she put herself under notice-me-not and disillusion spells to prevent anyone from noticing her. After some exploration Hermione noted that the village, while still small in comparison to the towns and cities on Earth was big enough to have a rural hospital, a market place and a school. The young muggleborn contemplated the idea of continuing further on the path that led through the mountains but in the end decided against it, after all she couldn’t be sure if the next village she found was equipped with a hospital.

The reason for that was that in all likelihood the young witch would need a hospital to complete her last step in leaving behind her identity as Hermione Granger.

When she had purchased the identity theft potion, Hermione had started to research ways to take on somebody else’s life with minimal fuss and suspicion. Her final conclusion was that she would have to stake out hospitals for dying women in her age class, this ensured that any personality change would be chalked up as consequence of the ‘memory loss’ the person would develop after waking up.  
And so Hermione had started to split her time between the hospital, the school and the Japanese equivalent of a tavern, a tea house to immerse herself into the language that had significant differences to the modern Japanese she had in her head.

At the end of her second week in the Elementals Hermione happened to be in the lobby when two men carried the body of a young unconscious woman in, the prognosis of the doctors was instantly grim and Hermione couldn’t help but think sardonically that Fate was finally cutting her some slack after having screwed her over this much.  
The name of the person she would assume was Yamaguchi Hisana. The young woman was the only survivor of a small town in the mountains of Bird Country and was now dying on her fatal injuries. The curly haired witch snorted inwardly while she listened to the gossiping nurses in the break room, you had to just love the sensationalism of humans.  
Having made up her mind about her new identity the only daughter of two dentists invaded the woman’s mind, this probe also confirmed what the doctors had thought, there was no self awareness present, only Hisana’s memories were left. While Hermione normally detested the mind arts for the harm they had caused during the war, they came in handy in this situation. The curly brunette copied the memories of the unconscious Hisana during a short night visit. After finishing with collecting the memories, the witch also extracted a blood and hair sample for the potion.  
Back at her temporary hideout Hermione went through the memories of the female she would take over. Yamaguchi Hisana was nineteen years old and the daughter of a relatively well off merchant. She had been spoilt rotten in her life, had live-in tutors and everything that she could wish for. Before the earth quake that had destroyed her home village had hit, her father had been in progress of negotiating her marriage with the son of the black smith, the second richest man in their little town. Hisana’s thoughts concerning her upcoming marriage had been mixed but she had never even played with the thought of disobeying her father. The black haired girl in a woman’s body was surprisingly well educated for her social status, she could play the ukulele and the pan flute and was also instructed in the politics of the Elemental nations, primarily in that of Bird and Earth country. Thinking over the standard education that people seemed to receive in the pocket dimension Hisana’s education was closer to that of a minor princess or samurai daughter than that of a merchant’s daughter, no matter how wealthy he was. Content with the back story of her new identity, Hermione planted the memories of Hisana’s life inside herself but kept them separate for the time being.  
From then on it was easy to put the civilian doctors and nurses of the small hospital under a time delayed memory charm and a separate compulsion that would end the moment Hisana died. The compulsion on the hospital room arranged that although the medical personnel recognized the dying of the woman and gave her suitable medication to make her comfortable, they would write down notations of her slow recovery in her file. This would solidify her identity should anybody dig into her past for whatever reason.

It took the original Hisana nearly two weeks to die. In that time Hermione worked herself through the memories inside her head and started to enhance those that she wanted to keep as well as fitted them in alongside her own memories.

During that process she subtly started to change her mind and character.


	3. Chapter 3

**The Transformation**

Wizards and witches were strongly disencouraged from tempering with their own minds. One single mistake could lead to a fatal personality shift or a complete loss of memory but Hermione was determined to risk it. She was going to start over as Yamaguchi Hisana, a blend of the bitter British witch Hermione Granger and the spoiled original Yamaguchi Hisana of Bird Country.

But before she could start with the creation of her new personality, Hermione took the time to create a back up copy of both original memories and thought processes; so that she could adjust her personality in whatever way she wished should she ever need it.  
In the end Hermione’s contribution to the new personality was her knowledge of potions, the body, first aid, runes, what wizards had found out about the Elemental countries, the knowledge about tactics used in the wizarding war as well as how to deal with the more shady characters of the underworld from her life as Hermione Granger. From Hisana the new personality received her education in manners, politics and instruments as well as the ability to ride horses of the Yamaguchi daughter. Hisana’s ability to manipulate people around her to do her biding was also added; the British witch had had a hard time with that in her previous life, she had been too no nonsense for that.  
Concerning their memories Hermione decided to lock most of her original memories into the back of her head and put the happier ones of Hisana to the forefront, so while she was aware of her memories as Hermione, they had a lessened impact on her. With Hisana’s childhood memories also came the deep understanding of the Bird Country culture, this came quite in handy because the knowledge about a culture you hadn’t grown up in normally took a life time to understand.  
This enhancing and suppressing of memories and abilities changed the core personality of the still curly haired witch.

To put it simple she became a lady with a hidden darker personality that could deal with the seedier aspects of life.

She had manners, knowledge and a razor sharp intellect; furthermore Hisana was also shrewd enough to manipulate a situation to her advantage while not being too jaded. The tampering took Hermione less than a day to complete, while the effects on her mind had her out of commission for nearly five days.  
When Hisana awoke in her little secret hideout in the attic of the hospital after being unconscious for so long she was nearly too weak to move and it took her a day and two nutritional potions to strengthen her body for the final change, the physical change.   
For that Hisana heated up the identity theft potion that she had bought on the black market of Korea, it had cost her nearly one fourth of the Potter wealth. She poured the preserved blood and the hair sample into it and when it had reached a drinkable temperature Hermione quickly choked it down.

On the morning of the ninth day after the original Hisana’s had been committed to the Mountain hospital her double came to life.

Hisana 0.2 as the witch called herself sarcastically was in agony. She had had a vague idea what to expect thanks to the polyjuice potion in her second year but this couldn’t compare, the pain was unbelievable, she was on the brink of insanity when it finally stopped and she was able to catch her breath. It took her the next three days to recover enough to use magic again and sneak into the hospital rooms bellow her. She barely made it in time for Hisana to die; thankfully she had the forethought of hitting the woman with a monitor charm that warned her when she was on the brink of death.

Hisana 0.2 changed the dead body of the woman whose identity she had taken on into a stone and threw it out of the window into the garden. The natural chakra around them would hold the transfiguration for up to three weeks without the witch having to do anything; which should be enough to be released and to find a proper burial side for the Original.

**Establishing one’s self**

One of the many disadvantages of being the only heiress to a merchant fortune was the greed of others.   
The moment it became clear that she was recovering, a message was sent out to the nearest business partner of Hisana’s father as well as messages to other business partners. Thankfully for the new Elemental Country resident the nearest located business partner was an elderly man with a soft spot for females. Hisana could remember that her father had brought her along a few times while she was a child and later in her teen years. Yamaguchi Hisei had approved of the honorable merchant that he had concluded business with and had not been afraid to leave his only child in said man’s care for up to two weeks.  
As soon as she was able to be moved Tesuo-dono had her bundled up in a carriage and transported to his residence. He was also the one who had sorted out the paperwork concerning her father’s will along with the marriage proposals that came in masses after the knowledge of her father’s death circulated in their social circles.  
One of the conditions Hisana’s overly cautious father had insisted on was that she had to prove her heritage via blood test in the capital. The young woman was now more than glad that the identity potion changed the makeup completely down to the last cell.   
Tesuo-dono had accompanied her to the capital after assisting her with the funeral procedures and commissioning a shrine on a cliff overlooking the area were once the destroyed village stood. The villagers of the town she had been treated in were very thankful for that because according to their/HER religion something had to be done to appease the souls of the killed people that hadn’t received a proper burial to prevent them from haunting the place.  
After fulfilling all the conditions of her father’s will Tesuo-dono asked Hisana what she wanted to do now that her father and fiancé were dead, did she wish for another betrothal.

Having learned more about the kind older man and also his nephew, who would take over the family after Tesuo-dono’s death, Hisana sold the goods and trading routes in her possession to them, while keeping only enough percentages in the business so that she could life a comfortable life on that alone. Furthermore he declined Tesuo-dono’s offer of arranging a marriage for her, she explained this to him that she needed time to heal before she could even think about marrying anybody. The old gentleman hadn’t been happy about this but had acquiesced to her wishes.

**Freedom and Grief**

Five months after arriving in Tesuo-dono’s household Hisana started her journey through the Elemental Countries. While the old merchant didn’t want to see her leave he couldn’t stop her because she was a legal adult with enough means to life on her own. Hisana left with a promise of frequent visits and letters to the family.

The black haired woman arrived after nearly a week of travelling in a caravan back in the capital of Bird Country, Torika. The city with it’s never ending streets and bustling population had attracted Hisana’s attention from the moment she had moved passed the main gates for the first time.  
There, relieved that she was finally free she spent nearly a month on a drinking binge with quite a lot of different bed partners. Hisana’s body had still been virginal when she took the identity potion but the civilian war survivor had rectified this the moment she was out of the reach of Tesuo-dono.   
During this time of excess Hisana mourned her dead loved ones both old and new and finally after nearly four years of just going through the motions she started to heal.

Hisana enjoyed her new freedom with expensive spa trips and long educational journeys through Tori no Kuni and the bordering countries, this was the kind of life she became used to rather quickly. After three months of doing nothing but living and spending the money that was in her bank accounts Hisana began to translate some of the books she had brought from the Outer world as a hobby, but the longer she wrote and translated she asked herself if she couldn’t turn this into a form of income.

Back in Bird Country Hisana found herself a publicist, a portly middle aged man with a keen sense for business, she left all decisions in his hands to only concentrate on writing and enjoying her new life.

**Old Passions and final Changes**

During her travels Hisana picked up vast amounts of books on every topic as well as antiquities and even jewelry. It often were the second hand shops that would to sell her the hidden gems for her fast growing collections. Hisana even bought jutsu scrolls and kenjutsu instruction manuals when she was in a particular mood, everything was interesting to her and she quite enjoyed the fact of being financial secure.  
As the months past by Hisana learned about the books that were considered rare, lost or a fable; she learned how to spot a forgery and slowly became known in the elite group of book collectors. In Hisana an old part of Hermione woke up, the part that had coveted written knowledge like no other and so the habit of buying books turned back into a long forgotten passion for knowledge and history. The books and jutsu scrolls were sent back to Bird Country where she rented a house for herself. This house was now overflowing with old tomes, boxes that were filled to the brim with scrolls weren’t even unpacked but just left in one of the empty rooms and her antiquities were neatly wrapped and fitted between the empty space of the boxes, and the collection was still growing.

Hisana lamented the fact that she couldn’t carry all the books on her person. It would have cost an immense sum and would have attracted unwanted attention from bandits and the likes. She also couldn’t use her Rune belt anymore to store them there. Hermione had been wrong; chakra and magic were two far apart from each other and her Rune knowledge had become as good as useless since turning into Hisana. In the months following her entrance into the Elemental countries she had had to concentrate more and more on making it work, until she had finally given up and stored her treasurers and books in different hideaways throughout the Elemental countries. Hisana admitted that the loss of her Rune capabilities had hurt somewhat but the black haired woman accepted it as price for this new life. She hadn’t felt so alive for a very long time, probably not even during her early Hogwarts years when she, Harry and Ron had explored the castle and the mysteries that had popped up every year.

Her magic using capabilities also got steadily worse until fourteen months into her new life; Hisana couldn’t use even the simplest levitation charm anymore. Funnily enough Legilimency and Occlumency didn’t seem to fall under this restriction at all. Quite to the contrary Hisana even had the feeling that these abilities had been strengthened since her arrival in the Elemental Countries.

While the witch Hermione had been disgusted und uncomfortable with using Legilimency because of her experience, her new personality didn’t have these qualms. And after this particularly skill had saved her from falling into the hands of a slave trader even the last discomfort vanished and she started to use it more regularly. Most of the time she just kept to the surface thoughts of her vis-a-vis so that she was not overwhelmed while it gave her the ability to scan others for potential dangers.

 


	4. Chapter 4

**Jiraiya**

The first time Hisana stumbled over that particular ninja was in Fuku Gai during her stay at an expensive spa resort. She had just entered the women only spring when she heard the perverted giggling behind the fence. Annoyed and in an already bad mood, Hisana had neither the patience nor the strength to deal with the pervert that was peeking on her.   
So she just stood up and flashed the man behind the fence, hopefully that would cut the annoying peeking short so that she could bath in peace. The next thing that she heard was a thumb against the fence; apparently the idiot had hit himself in surprise. With a snort and a satisfied smile the black haired woman sat back down again and enjoyed the hot water that loosened her muscles; hot springs were truly a marvel. An hour later she decided to leave the spring but not before she threw a glance over the fence, on the ground was an unconscious white haired man with dried blood on his nose.

Hisana found it amusing that thanks to the strong chakra flow in the dimension the human males, especially the stronger shinobi were quite capable of having a spurting nose bleed and pass out from the overstimulation. This phenomenon reminded her of those Japanese mangas she had read before coming here.

Smug and highly amused Hisana left the bath house and used the rest of the afternoon to proof read her notes for her newest children book.  
In the evening she left her room to find herself a place to eat, Hisana had spent endless hours concentrating on finding spelling mistakes and she was in search of good food and hopefully some decent company. While she strolled through the streets she recognized the white mane of hair that belonged to the pervert from before. Feeling somewhat vindictive and brash she changed her direction and strolled into the small restaurant, she was curious what his reaction would be, people here liked to save face after all.

She surprised the tall and well muscled white haired man by sitting down across from him and taking him in while he was in the middle of taking another bit of his noodles, after a moment he continued to eat while trying to pretend as if nothing had happened. Hisana had to hand it to him, he didn’t squirm,… too much, satisfied with her vis-à-vis’ reaction she finally started a conversation.

“How was the view?” she drawled out while she watched him joke on his soba.

He hacked and hmmed for a while before he sent her a good naturedly grin and wiggled with his eyebrows, “Magnificent.”

Hisana snorted and ordered a Bento Box from the waiter that had hurried over to their table.

The middle aged perverted introduced himself as Jiraiya of the Sannin, a ninja of Konohagakure no Sato and avid porn writer. He seemed fascinated with Hisana, even more so after she revealed that she was a fellow writer. The witch turned Elemental citizen couldn’t hold this against him from what she had seen in the last three years of her travelling the civilian women in these lands where mostly simpering creatures with only a few shining gems in between them.

The kunoichi population on the other hand was the exact opposite. They were strong, confident and not afraid of giving their opinion and so Hisana felt more kinship with them than their civilian counterparts. Unfortunately they were overemphasizing these traits most of the time and so turned a lot of potential suitors, even fellow ninja away.

The man across from her seemed to be quite interesting and friendly but you never knew what really was hidden behind a friendly smile and so her paranoid side urged the brown eyed woman to take a closer look at his mind.

Hisana noted the unconsciously erected barriers around topics like Konoha and Naruto but overall the ninja seemed to be friendly enough and there were no malicious thoughts near the surface or towards her person. With her quick scan finished Hisana relaxed back into her seat.

Surprisingly enough Hisana enjoyed the conversation with the man who could easily be her father. They discussed quite a variety of subjects and for the first time in two years she was thoroughly challenged on a intellectual level. Now she was glad that she had invested the first year to completely solidify her new identity and familiarize herself with the allies and old business partners of her father and also with the political climate in the different countries, it made the debate a lot more stimulation.   
The man in front of her was more than just a pervert and she quickly realized that behind the outrageous loud and boisterous porn writer facade was a sharp mind that had already lived through too much and tried to hide its wariness with playing the idiot. Hisana also came to the conclusion that she enjoyed listening to him while he talked about various subjects. He had a compelling voice that just drew you in, it didn’t hurt that Jiraiya was quite the amazing story teller and could describe landscapes and adventures so vividly that Hisana could practically see them come to life in front of her inner eye.

Jiraiya left three days later but before that they exchanged their published works and also made a promise of staying in touch. He left her with an address in Konoha while she told him to write to her publisher in Bird Country who would forward any mail to her via hawk messenger.

Leaving the town in a good mood Hisana really had absolutely NO idea what she just set in motion and how it would affect her life in the coming years.

**Jiraiya’s Thoughts**

On his way back to Konoha Jiraiya mulled over his bizarre meeting in Fuku Gai. He thought he had seen it all when this barely grown up girl in the hot springs had taken him completely by surprise.  
Yamaguchi Hisana was an enigma, he couldn’t remember having ever had such a sharp minded CIVILIAN interlocutor and a young woman at that, hell she was barely twenty one.

Because that was what she was, a civilian. During their conversation he had touched her arm to test her chakra system and while it was slightly larger than normal in a civilian it was still completely untrained. No wear or tear in the chakra coils like it would have been had she trained in the ninja arts since she was a child.

She also was she too unguarded for being a ninja. She wasn’t paranoid of her position and exits like a ninja would be, he had tested that too. During lunch of the second day he had manipulated her into the seat that was the most vulnerable in the whole restaurant and she hadn’t batted an eyelash before sitting down, although he had seen that she felt slightly uncomfortable with the loud noises at her back, which wasn’t that uncommon even in civilians.

Still there was something darker about her, Jiraiya speculated that something had to have happened to her because even if she tried to gloss it over she was wary of being completely alone with him and always steered them back to the more populated streets, away from dark and potentially dangerous corners. She also jumped at loud noises that she hadn’t anticipated and was quite skittish after those events. It was most curious; he would have to look what his network could find about her.

**Fuinjutsu**

The two authors met again only a month later during a book convention. Jiraiya had recognized Hisana while she wandered between the stands and was carrying a giant stack of newly acquired books in front of her face; said stack nearly prevented her from seeing her path. And she seemed to visibly struggle with the weight.

“Well well what do we have here? Hello there gorgeous!” Jiraiya’s voice rumbled into Hisana’s ear.

Said black haired woman nearly jumped out of her skin before she whirled around, “JIRAIYA! What the,… don’t do that! I nearly dropped the books!!!” Hisana complained while she shifted her burden from one hand to the other.

With a quick movement Jiraiya had freed Hisana from most of her books, carrying them in the crook of his arm like it was nothing.

Said Sannin asked incredulous, “Why don’t you seal the books and be done with it?”

“Seal??? You mean into a scroll like those jutsus you talked about in Fuku Gai? Jiraiya! Hello! Remember who you are talking to! I’m civilian I have no idea how to seal anything.” Hisana answered while she rolled her eyes, “Although to be honest that would be really useful. I always have to send my books back home via caravan or messenger hawk and it gets exhausting after a while!”

“Well why don’t you learn it then?” Jiraiya asked curious.

“Beca… wait what? I thought this is a ninja thing and civilians can’t learn.” Hisana answered confused.

“It’s not that civilians can’t learn, it’s more the fact that you have to learn how to control your chakra flow to activate them and most of you civilians are simply too lazy for that, but there are some who use it. In Konoha nearly all of the merchant families have expertise in it, some even specialized in it.” the white haired shinobi explained while he took the woman in front of him in.

“Show me.” Hisana demanded while a determined glint lit her eyes up.

Hisana had to admit that she was annoyed that such a simple solution to her book problems had been right under her nose the whole time, Fuinjutsu was just the Elemental Countries version of Runes, that she hadn’t checked it out sooner was irking her somewhat fierce.

Jiraiya snorted and warned her, “Okay, but don’t get frustrated if it doesn’t work the first few times. You’ll need patience and a lot of practice.”

And so they spent a part of the two week convention with Jiraiya teaching her the basics of the sealing arts as well as how to access and use her chakra to activate and deactivate said seals.   
The white haired shinobi was quiet impressed with how quick Hisana picked up the basic rules and had a grasp on the material, she even made her seal react slightly after her fourth try, something that he had never seen before. Her rapid success had made him suspicious at first but then he realized that she just used her analytical mind and quick comprehension that she used on everything else and so he relaxed a bit and gave her the benefit of the doubt.   
It was really quite fascinating for Jiraiya to see how she worked out the functions of those basic seals with a series of trial and error. In the end it took her only ten days to make her first seal work, it was quite astonishing; it took some ninja weeks if not months to work that out and they had learned how to draw chakra since they were children.   
Her only major setback at this art was the fact that she was new to channeling chakra and could only make the seals with the lowest chakra usage work before becoming too exhausted and frankly he doubted that she would ever be able to advance over Chunin level seals. A pity, really.   
Hisana would have probably made a fine Fuinjutsu master if somebody had trained her from a young age, now as an adult her chances were pretty slim if not downright nonexistent to find a tutor or even amass enough chakra reserves to become even mediocre.

Hisana was quite content with this useful skill she had acquired in those two weeks. She would continue to experiment with different Fuinjutsu and compare them to Rune Magic. Why hadn’t she thought about this before? Of course the people here had to have adapted the Rune language to a more useable concept for them! This skill would solve a lot of her problems concerning carrying a large amount of objects on her person, like she had done before as witch.

So the next time she visited Bird Country she dissolved the renting contract with her landlord and sealed her books and other belongings in three scrolls with a nearly twenty meters length. The special scrolls had been quite expensive but were more than worth it because now she was able to simplify her travelling through the drastically reduced mass.  
It also eased her mind to know that her most precious belongings (books) as well as her wealth were on hand and could be appropriated like she wanted without long trips to get it out of her hideaways.

The blood security seals were another godsend to Hisana, as soon as she had found out about that particular concept she had practiced it so often that she felt like she could draw the seal in her sleep. This particular seal made the scrolls nearly completely thief proof because without the right blood they couldn’t be opened and were so useless to the thief.

It then took months until she saw Jiraiya again, both had been too busy with their own lives to be able to do anything else then write the occasional letter.  
When she finally saw Jiraiya again she showed him the collection of Fuinjutsu books she had amassed and asked him which other books he would recommend for individual Fuinjutsu studies. Jiraiya’s reaction was a bit different than Hisana had expected, instead of a jovial answer he had skirted around the topic and then always deflected in the following days, something about her question had triggered something in her fellow writer and made him wary. In the end Hisana didn’t have to bluntly confront him after a few days her white haired friend seemed to have gotten over whatever had bothered him and he relaxed again around her.  
Jiraiya was a surprisingly good teacher, even if he only gave her nudges in this or that direction. It helped a lot to further her grasp the concept of the sealing arts even if she would never be able to become a true master in it. Jiraiya had informed her regretfully that her chakra capability was too small for that and while being somewhat disappointed Hisana had accepted this as a fact of life.   
The white haired Sannin had really seemed concerned about how she would take his findings. But Hisana just winked him away. The knowledge that she still could read and understand the more complicated Fuinjutsu concepts was enough for her. She didn’t need to attempt the, to be honest, giant and bat shit insane sealing arcs to feel the satisfaction of having something accomplished.

Jiraiya had looked so completely flabbergasted and out of his depth at that, that Hisana couldn’t help but laugh and pat his arm, “What did you think would happen? That I throw a tantrum or go off the deep end just because something is not going my way? Really Jiraiya that would be just utterly childish.”

Strangely enough the answer only increased Jiraiya’s discomfort.

 


	5. Chapter 5

**A year later**

Hisana had been on the road for quite some time now, she had already seen parts of Earth Country, Tea Country, Fire Country and soon she would visit some of the smaller Countries in between before she crossed over to Suna. Her publisher had wanted to organize a safe journey for her now that her books became more and more popular and he made a lot of money through her but Hisana had vehemently declined. She enjoyed the spontaneity of deciding from one moment to the next to change directions or to stay longer in one place furthermore she definitely didn’t need a babysitter.

The black haired and brown eyed woman loved her new occupation. Being a writer had turned out to be a lot more interesting than she had first thought. Early on Hisana had decided to concentrate on children books and fictional novel, writing books about serious or academic topics would only draw the attention of the wrong people. And so she rewrote the already published stories of Earth to fit into the Elemental Country culture and adapted the ones with a hidden message to spread her own believes while keeping it very subtle. She even started on writing her own, original series between the adapted versions and to her delight they were just as popular if not even more so than her plagiarized stories.

To speed up the publishing process Hisana had begun to send the finished chapters per Hawk messengers back to Torika. Said birds were stationed in every bigger town and would transport messages or documents for a reasonable fee between the biggest cities. To be able to receive updates about her book selling’s and also to get the fan mail forwarded, Hisana also always included her next bigger destination as a forwarding point for her publisher, this sort of communication had worked out surprisingly well.

Answering her fan mail had started to take on a pretty large part of her time because she felt the need to read every letter and write at least a short reply or thank you note to the well thought out ones. This had led to her developing a minor circle of pen pals; the majority of them had picked up on the hidden messages in the books and since then Hisana enjoyed political and ethical debates with educated people around the Elemental Countries. To her consternation nearly all of them were male, she had only two female conversationalists that were just as political savvy as the rest of their male counterparts and both of them were already in their early fifties.

And so Hisana was sitting in the tea shop of a border town of Fire Country and read through the letters that she had received the day before. Sighing she rubbed her eyes, a pressure headache had been building since this morning and she was only one loud noise away from just abandoning the letters and hiding under her bed covers to just sleep the day away.   
When she reached for her next later she stopped short, this one was a lot thicker than the other generic ones. Slightly paranoid from Hermione’s encounter with Bubotuber puss during her Hogwarts years she moved the envelope as far away from her face as possible and slit it open.   
The envelope contained two written sheets and a couple of sketches.

Suddenly Hisana wasn’t so tired anymore and the headache was slowly receding, it was from Jiraiya. That old pervert had held his word and had written her more or less regularly since their first meeting, and now it wasn’t uncommon to receive one or two letters a month, often accompanied by more or less perverted sketches.  
The two also had started to meet up regularly every three to four months. In the first two days of their meetings they would either drink themselves stupid or complain about the publicists before their conversation turned to much more pleasant topics. Like the different travel routes they took or the latest political faux-pas of the nobles.

Concerning the nobles of the Elemental countries the white haired Konoha shinobi had a rather dangerous vice; he had this bad habit of including the dirty laundry of the Elemental countries ruler families into his books. Those were of course hidden and nearly made unrecognizable but they were still there for everybody to read about. If that ever came to the light it could mean Jiraiya’s death, after all the nobles didn’t particular like to be made fool off.  
It took Hisana only two chapters into his newest book at that time to cotton onto the older author, since then she sent him gossip about the nobles whenever possible. It was just too amusing to see potential epic black mail turn up in a surprisingly well written porn book without the masses realizing it.

Hisana and Jiraiya also had started a habit of proof reading the work of the other after their third meeting. A second opinion often helped them to improve their writing styles and solve their writing blockades even though the two were in completely different genres.

_Dear Magnificent view,_

She snorted, he couldn’t let go of that could he? In the time they had spent together it had become a sort of ritual. He badgered her about drawing her and using her in his books and she showed him exactly what she thought of that idea when she pulled at his ear and long hair more or less gently.

_it has come to my attention that you are participating in the book convention in three months in Fang Country, what a coincidence, so will I!_

Tze coincidence, that word didn’t exist in Jiraiya’s vocabulary, he had arranged this without any doubt!   
Hisana was relatively sure that there hadn’t been an Erotica book exhibit planned. What irked her was how he always seemed to know where her manager would be sending her next. After all she had only gotten the notice about the convention the day before!

_Want to meet up? Maybe in the hot springs of the Maruno spa resort? I always find my inspiration stimulated when I visit this resort! And maybe I can entice you to become the new star of my latest novel?_

In his dreams!

_Your travel guide has been very helpful my dear, I look forward to more!_

Hisana was glad that he liked it. Between writing her books the brown eyed young woman had started to assemble all her notes about the different Elemental country travel paths in a travel guide. Hisana had sent this book along in her last letter to the white haired shinobi and she had been anxious about his critic. Somehow the perverted shinobi had managed to make Hisana care about his opinion, that sneaky bastard!

_Concerning travelling, I happen to be in the north of Fire country at the moment and I found this lovely place called,…_

_Yours Jiraiya_

Finished with reading the letter the female author contemplated the information she had just received. Well at least Hisana could be sure that the book convention wouldn’t be boring. Any convention involving Jiraiya could be anything between slightly amusing to downright hilarious!

After finishing with his description of the landscape and spa scape of the northern Fire country a second time she noticed the changed address on the bottom of the letter. As always Jiraiya had sent her a new forwarding point. Oh well, she knew he was a ninja and a particular famous one so it made only sense to change address regularly. Coming to the last few pages she took the drawings into her hands…

That pervert, he had peaked at her again!!!

Hisana couldn’t help herself but laugh. On every page she was drawn in a more or less exaggerated way. Seriously she wasn’t sure if some of these drawings would even be able to walk with the amount of cleavage weighting them down.   
That knucklehead,… childish as always, seriously!

She took the sketches in one more time, Jiraiya was talented there was no doubt about it. Even if he exaggerated too much and his comments to each picture were hilarious! Throwing those away would be a waste, so she folded them and put them and the letter in a special scroll dedicated to Jiraiya’s and her letter conversation.

Now what to write as an answer???

 **Jiraiya** **Interlude**

Finally home!

That was the only thought Jiraiya had when he entered the gates of Konoha and made his way to the Hokage tower to report to his old teacher that he was back and leave the package of important intel to be evaluated by the T&I. Anything else would have to wait until tomorrow, he had made a grueling pace to reach Konoha and deliver this vital information by hand and now the only thing that he wanted to do was sleep!

The next morning he was almost chipper after sleeping for twelve hours straight. Jiraiya made his way to the Hokage tower with only a quick stop at the newly upgraded public bath. There he scouted for new vantage points to catch glances of the female population of Konoha while they were bathing.

After arriving at his old teacher’s office he gave a more detailed report from the short version yesterday in front of Nara Shikaku, the Jounin commander, Yamanaka Inoichi, the head of the intel division and Morino Ibiki, their torture specialist. This was followed by covertly handing over the newest volume of Icha Icha to the Hokage, after all his sensei was an avid reader.

When they had concluded their discussion of the more pressing matters, Sarutobi asked him with a grave and concerned voice if he could make sense of one of the letters of his informants. The T&I department had been trying to decode that particular letter for more than three weeks and couldn’t make heads or tails out of it. Some of the more driven members were close to a mental break down because the letter was eating up all their free time. Slightly concerned Jiraiya asked for said letter to take a look himself but as soon as he saw the elegant script he burst out in booming laughers.

Yamanaka Inoichi was slightly miffed, what was so funny? His people had been working day and night to make sense of it and Jiraiya was laughing?

Calming down to sniggers Jiraiya grinned at the shinobi in the room and said, “Ah well, this is no report. This is the answer from a very dear acquaintance of mine; I must have given her the wrong address.”

The ninjas in the room sweet dropped. Inoichi who had practically learned the letter by heart blushed slightly and coughed into his hand.

Still grinning Jiraiya read through the letter.

_Dear Peeping tom,  
do I even want to know how you found out about my schedule? Again??? No wait don’t answer that. _

_The north of Fire sounds beautiful, by the way you describe that particular landscape I take you have been visiting often, give me a recommendation where I can hide from my manager, the old fart is driving me crazy again.  
As soon as that thing in Fang is over I’m going on an extended vacation. What do you say, do you have time to visit or will you have to gather ‘ahem’ IMPORTANT information in a resort? ;)_

_Concerning the drawings, …haha… can those “improved” me’s even walk straight? Because I kind of doubt that! And as always the answer to your question is NO. Seriously do you have any idea what my Torture expert of a publicist would do to me if somebody recognized me in your books? After that I would have to seek refuge on an island in Water Country or something similar. So don’t even think about it!_

_Ugh and you were right, Kusa was damn boring, everybody was so stern and frankly the Daimyo is a dick! I’m so glad that I’m back in Taki!_

_By the way how is that book coming along, still having a writer block? Just a hint, in three weeks in Tea Country is the opening of the biggest spa resort of the country, it’s probably worth checking it out. Oh and I expect a copy of your newest book! After that stuck up Daimyo I need something to amuse myself._

_Yours Hisana_

Smiling slightly Jiraiya looked up, his sensei was watching like a hawk.

Than the old Hokage coughed and asked, “A fellow writer, maybe even in the same genre as you?”

Jiraiya’s smile became even wider, “Sadly no, funnily enough she writes children’s books most of the time but she proofreads my work when we meet up and she also gives some very good advice concerning the female point of view! She is very talented for her age!”

“Her age?” now Sarutobi’s left eyebrow wandered upwards.

With a loud laugh Jiraiya looked back at the letter and then said, “Yes she is only twenty three after all!”

“WHAT???? Jiraiya-sama are you sure that she isn’t somebody sent to become close to,…”, with a hand wave Jiraiya interrupted Inoichi’s sentence.

“I very much doubt that. I’ve tested her chakra network before I showed her some sealing tricks. She had never used her chakra before that point, her channels were completely without tears and of course I had her background checked after we met for the first time.” said Jiraiya in a resolute voice.

Now Sarutobi glanced worriedly at his student, “Now wait Jiraiya,… maybe Inoichi is right, she doesn’t have to be a ninja to be a spy.”

Sighing annoyed Jiraiya and sent a wordless apology to Hisana, “Her name is Yamaguchi Hisana and she is twenty three. She is the only daughter of a wealthy merchant, deceased and lived in Bird Country until she was nineteen. From what I have found out she had a pretty thorough education during her childhood and was engaged to be married when she turned twenty to the local blacksmith son. Shortly after she turned nineteen a rock slide took out the complete village with the exception of initial three survivors. They were brought to the neighboring village for medical attention; Hisana was the only one that survived the journey to the village and the treatment. After her recovery she was taken in by a business partner of her father’s who brought her to the capital where she did a blood test to be recognized as heiress. Apparently her father was a bit paranoid. The business was sold and Hisana began to travel and until today she hasn’t stopped.”

Sarutobi nodded and asked, “How did you two meet, I mean you two don’t seem to travel in the same circles from what I gathered of her background.”

Now Jiraiya coughed, “Uh, well you see,… I was researching in Fuku Gai when she entered the hot springs and well I may have drawn her attention…”

“And she screamed and hit you?” Ibiki dead panned.

“No, or I wouldn’t have found her so interesting. No she stood up and flashed me.” Jiraiya said in good humor while he thought back at their first meeting. The eyes of his fellow shinobi popped out at that sentence and Jiraiya couldn’t help but grin salacious before he continued, “She told me later that she had had a bad day and didn’t have the patience left to deal with an idiot.”

At that Jiraiya scratched his head while he grinned to himself, her answer had remembered him a lot of Tsunade at that time.

“And what happened then?” Shikaku asked interested, personally for himself this would have been too troublesome.

“,… well I passed out and after I woke up she had already left. I met her later that evening again when she entered the soba bar I sat in and asked me how the view was… she is quite an interesting one, not so boring submissive like normal civilian women!” the white haired shinobi explained smiling slightly.

Now all men in the room were more or less amused, they could understand why such a meeting had endeared Hisana to Jiraiya.

“Well, Inoichi I still want you to take a look at her but I don’t think that she is an immediate threat, if she is even one but you can’t be too careful. Dismissed.” The Hokage said before the shinobi left his office.


	6. Chapter 6

Publicists are annoying.

To this conclusion Hisana had came only a week after signing the contract years ago and so far it hadn’t changed. In the coming weeks her contract would run out and she had been hounded to renew the piece of paper that would bind her soul for another two to ten years. To be honest Hisana was seriously thinking about not extending it.

In her short time as author she had written two series of children books, each one of them already three books strong. As well as two fantasy novels and a collection of short child friendly stories. The collection as well as one of the fantasy novels were of her own creation and had been a lot of work.

Hisana hadn’t known what was normal for a writer to produce per year and her publicist had never given her any inclination how well she had done until Jiraiya had pulled the wool away from her eyes. It wasn’t normal to write that many books in so few years, Jiraiya had also advised her to slow down and pace herself or she could easily risk a burn out.

Doing exactly that, Hisana wrote a polite but firm letter to the publisher that she would take at least a year-long time out and would focus just on herself. She promised that she would take him into consideration when she continued her writing career but kept the rest of her inclinations vague. After sending the letter via hawker messenger she also contacted her lawyer in Bird country and informed him about her decision and that he should take care of the legal repercussions as well as the forwarding of her fan mail, maybe she should also consider a personal assistant? Hisana would have to ponder that topic.

Having finally dealt with the situation that had been costing her sleep, Hisana felt a lot more relaxed while she wandered through the Land of Lighting. This time, on Jiraiya’s urging, she had acquiesced and hired a Kumo team to lead her through the country and to Kumogakure. Thanks to her popularity as an author it was easily granted. The chunin team remained polite but distant all four weeks long and while Hisana couldn’t complain she felt slightly disappointed.

In Kumogakure Hisana purchased several paintings of the picturesque Mountain View as well some very interesting books and scrolls. She refrained from her normal slightly shadier book deals with the local black market because she knew that she was too much under scrutiny of the ninjas to get away with it. One of the most bizarre moments during her stay in Kumo was when she was confronted with a rapping ninja that wanted an autograph for both of his fantasy novels,… a rapping ninja,… it had taken Hisana some time to wrap her head around this phenomenon.

After leaving Lighting Country Hisana was unsure what to do next, normally something or another would have caught her fancy by then and she would have made her way in this or that direction but this time she had an uneasy feeling. Her gut told her something was going to happen and if there was something she had learned throughout her life it was to trust those feelings.   
Hisana noticed that more often than not the hair on her neck started to rise, which was a sure sign that somebody was watching her. Without a concrete idea of what was going to happen she did the only sensible thing she could think of. She wrote a letter to Jiraiya explaining her uneasy feeling and her suspicion that she was being followed as well as the fact that she would make her way to Fuku Gai. The town was in Fire Country and the likelihood that Jiraiya was in his home country was bigger than any other city she could come up with. After sending this message with an emergency hawk in direction of Konoha Hisana felt slightly better.  
The following day she then informed her hotel that she wanted to join the next caravan in direction of Fuku Gai. As soon as she was on the road the bad feeling became even worse and awakened long suppressed battle instincts in her. Now Hisana was cursing herself for never taking up any type of self defense and being utterly helpless in this situation.

Three days away from Fuku Gai Hisana’s worst fears became reality. The caravan was attacked; the civilians around her were slaughtered and the last thing she could remember was a dull pain on the side of her neck before everything went black.

The black haired twenty four year old author awoke an undefined number of hours later, shackled at her hands in a shed like room and with a sore cheek. The following days were some of the most daunting in Hisana’s life, even during the Horcrux hunt Hermione hadn’t felt so helpless and exposed. But even then the black haired woman forced herself to not lose hope, after all she had informed Jiraiya via letter about her bad feeling and the ninja had never ridiculed her about her gut feeling. Quite the contrary in fact, he had often remarked how astute her assessments of various mutual acquaintances were and had started to take her instincts seriously when they were proven correct more and more often. Of course most of those so called feelings were carefully down toned versions of what she caught from her surface skims but Jiraiya didn’t need to know that.

The kidnappers always kept her blindfolded during the time they moved between places and only let her take it off when she was secured in one hideout or the other. The rough looking men that came and went from her rooms surprisingly didn’t touch her. For this fact she was more than thankful but they were still frightening her enough with their hungry gazes and vulgar gestures in her direction. This uncertainty nearly drove her crazy. Thankfully their leader, a missing nin from Ame, had an iron control over his underlings, and so when he had given out the order that she was not to be touched they obeyed.

As thankful Hisana was about this fact it made her curious about his reasons. She received her answer during the night of the third day when they were using a cave to keep her imprisoned; she couldn’t see anything because of the fact that she was behind a natural formed corner but because of the lack of doors she could still listen. She overheard two of her guards speculating why their employer from Bird Country wanted her so completely unharmed and untouched. That piece of information didn’t help her nerves the slightest bit. She spent all night restless while she frantically went through the list of men who could possibly want something from her so badly that they would kidnap her and for what purpose.

Her imprisonment ended abruptly on the fourth day after the caravan massacre. Hisana awoke when she heard the shout and screams, both frightened and angry outside her. A few uncertain moments later a familiar figure brought tears to her eyes, in front of her stood Jiraiya.  
The shinobi had a grim and uncommonly serious expression on his face when he slowly kneeled in front of her and took her hands into his bigger ones. Hisana just watched him as he carefully opened the shackles with a senbon needle. When the metal finally fell to the ground, he hesitantly drew nearer before he carefully scooped her up. Hisana couldn’t help but let out a relieved sob before she buried herself in his broad chest, her hands anchored themselves reflexively in his haori. Jiraiya carried her outside into the nearly blinding sunshine and slowly put Hisana on her feet while still keeping a protective hold on her small frame. In the meadow in front of them was a group of Konoha ninja that was finishing hogtying the surviving few kidnappers. From the once nearly thirty men strong gang were only four still alive, the missing nin leader amongst them.   
Hisana tried not to gag while she turned her head once more into Jiraiya’s chest it had been a long time since Hermione had seen such carnage and her new persona had never had to deal with such a situation before.

A woman detached herself from the ninja team and drew closer to them. Hisana instantly recognized her as medic nin thanks to her white skirt and big pouches along her belt. The female author frowned slightly when the woman came to a stop in front of her and gently asked her if she would allow her to examine her. Then she suddenly understood why Jiraiya had acted so uncertain and careful with her before, it had confused her because Jiraiya had never hesitated to hug her before.

She turned her head so that both of them could understand her and said, “It’s fine. The only things I received are some abrasives and my sore wrists. They didn’t touch me if that’s what you want to know. Their leader, that missing nin over there, had them pretty good under control...”

Behind her Jiraiya exhaled slightly louder than normal and the unconscious tension of the thirty-something kunoichi in front of her fell away. The blue grayish haired woman ran her green palmed hands over Hisana’s wrists as well as the bruised cheek and joined, after finishing her job, her comrades once more.

“It was lucky that I was in Konoha when your message arrived or else it could have taken weeks for me to find out. Still when I reached Fuku Gai the caravan had already been attacked and there were only a few survivors I worried.” the more relaxed Jiraiya told her while he offered her a water bottle.

Hisana accepted it thankfully and after a hasty gulp she answered, “I didn’t know what else to do. The moment the Kumo ninja left me at the boarder I felt eyes on me. I kept in as big groups as possible and the moment I arrived in a bigger city I messaged you, I was pretty certain that you were in Konoha but the caravan to Konoha had already left at that time. Fuku Gai was as close as I could get with a big caravan until you had received my letter. I knew you wouldn’t brush my concerns aside. Kami-sama I felt so completely helpless the last few days.”

“I’m sorry you had to go through that.” Jiraiya looked strangely helpless while he stood beside Hisana.

Said female just shook her head, “It’s okay, to be honest it’s a miracle that something like this hasn’t happened before, after all I travelled alone most of the time. I’m just a bit shaken up, don’t mind me.” The last part was said with a slightly shaky smile.

Jiraiya looked far away while he stared at the mountain range behind us before he continued to speak, “I… when I heard about the caravan massacre I thought my heart stopped for a moment. It’s one thing to get the news about comrades that were injured or killed during missions but at least I know that they have a fighting chance. With you being a civilian it’s a complete other can of worms.”

Hisana’s eyes widened slightly at this admission before they became softer and she said warmly, “Don’t worry, if there is something I have learned from this, is that I will try to travel in shinobi protected caravans from now on. Although to be honest after that scare I will probably drastically reduce my travelling for the near future.”

Jiraiya just nodded beside her while they slowly made their way to the other Konoha ninja, “So you will return to Bird Country.” The white haired Sannin stated with a careful blank face.

“Oh hell no, no way!” cam the vehement answer from Hisana before she continued, “It was somebody from Bird country that I have to thank for the kidnapping. Yesterday I overheard some of the men talking about how that ‘old coot’ from Bird Country wanted me unharmed and that’s why they weren’t allowed to touch me. So no, I will probably either stay in Fire Country or Tea Country, whatever tickles my fancy more.”

Jiraiya’s right eyebrow wandered up at that information but he just nodded, before he finally said seriously, “You had a lot of luck Hisana. That group of thugs has been making trouble for quite some time now and that’s why the chunin team was already here and tracking them when I arrived, it sped the process of finding you up a lot. The administration back in Konoha will probably want your statement. Do you think you can make a detour or do you have to be somewhere?”

“No I have all the time in the world, I just dissolved my contract with my publisher, I took your words to heart and I’m taking some time away from writing.” explained.

Jiraiya smiled at that and it seemed as if his normal happy go lucky attitude was back. After their talk they made their way over to the rest of the ninja team.

“Alright guys, this is Yamaguchi Hisana, a fellow author colleague of mine. She will accompany us to Konoha to make her statement.” The oldest ninja announced.

“Yamaguchi Hisana…, the children books author?” came the hesitant question of the blonde ninja to the left.

“Yes that’s me. It’s very nice to meet you all.” Hisana confirmed and greeted the ninja with a slight bow.

Said ninja’s eyes went wide before he coughed and then asked slightly embarrassed, “Would it be too much to ask for an autograph? My daughter is an avid fan of your books.”

“Of course, I would love too. How old is your daughter and what is her name?” Hisana asked delighted and started a conversation with the shinobi in front of her.

The young woman was glad for the distraction, the Chunin kept her occupied while Jiraiya vanished with another shinobi into the woods. Half an hour later they reappeared with a horse carriage and on top of it was her luggage. Hisana couldn’t help but sigh in relief and wandered over to the wagon.

“Are these your things? We found them close to the camp of the thugs.” The ninja accompanying Jiraiya asked.

“Yes,… it doesn’t look like anything is missing.” Hisana mumbled under her breath.

With a quick step she was on top of the carriage and examined her travel box. With some chakra to the side of the box she opened it up and checked for any visible damage. Relieved that she couldn’t find any she flinched when suddenly Jiraiya appeared beside her, he threw the giant scrolls inside the box a curious look.

“Are those sealing scrolls? Hisana what are you lugging with you around that would take up so much space?” he asked incredulous.

“Why, my book collection of course.” Hisana deadpanned while she also thought about the ready gold supply and antiquities she had hidden within them.

As an answer Jiraiya choked, the ninja team around them just threw them confused looks.

“Are you telling me you are carrying your nearly thirty thousand book strong library with you wherever you go?” came the incredulous question of the white haired shinobi.

The Chunins eyes nearly popped out of their heads.

“Hhmpf, my library wouldn’t be of use if I couldn’t access it and no, not all books are in here, only about three quarters of them… What did you think I would do when I asked you all those questions about mass sealing objects?” Hisana nearly pouted, why was this so unbelievable?

Jiraiya broke out in incredulous belly laughers before he shook his head and sighed, “When you approached me about it I thought you were talking hypothetically.”

The travelling box was closed once more and Jiraiya attached it with a strange Fuinjutsu seal that she had never seen on his own backpack. He then gathered her into his arms while the other Chunins slung the unconscious criminals over their shoulders and took off into the trees.  
Hisana had to bite her lip to keep from shrieking the first five minutes. She hated heights, as both Hisana and Hermione she had absolutely abhorred them but she wouldn’t give her weakness in front of strangers away. With Jiraiya alone she would have no problems but the unknown Chunin team made her bear this situation with gritted teeth. Twenty minutes into travelling at this speed, Hisana finally found a way to relax and somewhat enjoy it. She kept her eyes firmly on her surroundings and never once looked down on the forest floor.

The journey to Konoha went by relatively quick, in two days they had reached the valley in which Konohagakure had been built and in the morning of the third day they arrived at the giant gates with the Leaf symbol.  
During the trip Hisana had noted how the trees had steadily increased in height until they were nearly five times the size of normal trees. She couldn’t help but marvel about this tremendous bout of evolution; even in the Amazon rainforest you couldn’t find such tall trees. This change of vegetation made her also more determined to keep her head straight in the treetops and never EVER look down.

At the main gate Hisana was quickly registered and after a quick goodbye to the Chunin team Hisana followed Jiraiya to the Hokage tower.


	7. Chapter 7

On the way to the Hokage tower they had passed a lot of shinobis as well as civilians, most of them seem to know Jiraiya in one way or the other because the looks varied from blatant hero worship over respect to complete and utter disdain, the latter was sent primarily by women. Secretly this amused Hisana immensely; it seemed as if more than one of the ladies had been used as inspiration by the white haired Sannin and were taking offense to it.

After arriving at the tower they were quickly led up to the Hokage’s office, on the way up Hisana noticed with interest the intricate architecture and confusing room layout. The black haired woman was sure that this had been done on purpose to make attacks and ambushes as hard as possible.   
In the medium sized room that Hisana quickly identified as the anteroom of the Hokage office, Jiraiya had a quick nearly inaudibly word with the secretary before the two were led into a spacious half round room.   
Behind the impressive desk sat an old and slightly fragile looking man with many wrinkles.

At a first glance the black haired woman was reminded of the old Hogwarts headmaster but the moment she was close enough to look into the Hokage’s eyes she rapidly changed her mind. Albus Dumbledore and Sarutobi Hiruzen couldn’t have been more different.

Sarutobi’s eyes were treacherous, they had a kind of grandfatherly twinkle just like Albus Dumbledore’s had but underneath was something cold, calculating and lethal that sent shivers down her back. Before her sat somebody very very dangerous and now she also understood why this man, who had clearly long since passed his prime, still was in power of one of the biggest ninja villages of the Elemental Countries.

Hisana instantly knew that she would have to be very careful about searching the Hokage’s thoughts, she now came to realize the true danger that she was exposed to, should the old man in front of her somehow suspect her of some kind of deception she would be hopelessly and completely at his mercy, in that case even her friendship with Jiraiya wouldn’t save her from interrogation and her possible death. Still she had to give it a try, after all the known threat was still better then the unknown one.

Her careful controlled scan of his surface thoughts just further supported her first impression, the speed and complexity of the thought processes impressed Hisana immensely. In front of her was a man who could easily keep up with her own admittedly frightening mental capabilities.   
On the other hand this scan also made Hisana relax a bit about her stay in this village. Shinobi villages as a whole had always made her nervous. They contained too many perceptive and paranoid people that could be watching her. Hisana didn’t illusion herself about the fact that should even one of them have the slightest suspicion about her identity or some special abilities she would be snatched off the street faster then she could say Hogwarts’ library. Ninja were too curious for their own good and had no qualms in kidnapping people, some of them may be uncomfortable with it but the majority wouldn’t even blink at it.   
The fact that this was Jiraiya’s hometown made her even more wary, she like the older man and would hate it to lose his friendship because she had to flee from his overzealous comrades. Which would probably not work anyway if she was honest with herself, after all her magic was gone now and she was up against ninja,… trained assassins that were at least faster and stronger if not even more cunning then herself.

Hisana had to forcefully call herself back to reality to not sink into the endless possibilities of what they could do with her should she be discovered, after all it looked like she didn’t have to worry at the moment.  
The Hokage in front of her was trying to find evidence of her being a planted spy from another ninja village to spy on Jiraiya. From what she could gather from his thoughts he normally would have left this to the T&I squad of Konoha but because Jiraiya was his student he oversaw this investigation personally.  
Since the moment she had walked into the room he had begun to analyze her and finally concluded that while she was certainly unusual, she wasn’t a trained spy. After this thought had taken over the main part of his forefront thoughts Hisana carefully extracted herself before she mulled over the additional information she just had received. While Sarutobi certainly wasn’t above manipulating her, he didn’t have any malicious or harmful thoughts in reference to her as person and while he had begun to realize that she was a potentially stronger wild card then he had anticipated, the old man at least didn’t see anything particular suspicious in her behavior that would call for a visit with the darker side of the shinobi forces.

All this thought processes happened in fraction of seconds so that when she came to a halt in front of the desk she had finished her first evaluation of the Hokage and could concentrate on what was happening around her.

While Hisana was sizing up the shinobi in front of her and calculating potential outcomes from the measure of intelligence she would show, said man in turn cataloged his findings and analyzed her in turn.

Sarutobi had to agree with Jiraiya; Yamaguchi Hisana was clearly not an average civilian woman. The way she held his gaze, his eyes that had intimidated older and more seasoned civilians and shinobi with their sharpness, it didn’t seem to bother her. Quite the contrary in fact, the head of the Sarutobi clan noticed how she relaxed slightly after she seemingly had finished her assessment of him. To be honest Hiruzen felt amused, this young civilian woman had done something what a lot of shinobi didn’t even dare to think about, she had openly assessed him and had apparently decided that he was not a threat. Her next move surprised him somewhat because by the way she smiled at him and bowed slightly deeper than a woman of her stand would have to she showed him a sincere kind of respect that a lot rarer with civilians than shinobi.

On the side of the room Jiraiya watched the meeting between Sarutobi and Hisana with a mixture of apprehensiveness and curiosity; he had a vague idea that he was witnessing the clash of two intellectual titans. In the time since meeting Hisana Jiraiya had realized quickly that concerning mental and analytical matters Hisana far outranked him, the speed with which she memorized and analyzed information surprised and awed him again and again. He would go so far as call Hisana a genius on par with the brightest members of the Nara clan as well as his own sensei.  
While he listened to the exchange of pleasantries of two of his closest relations he couldn’t help the feeling that he was missing an entirely other conversation that he just couldn’t see but was obvious to both of the interlocutors. Even with all his deception training and experience he was only able to pick up the general feeling of their conversation.

“Yamaguchi Hanare, I presume.” _Jiraiya told me of you._

“Hai, Hokage-sama.” _Is that so?_

Cheeky brat, the third Hokage couldn’t help but think amused, oh she was interesting alright. The female that had just barely reached womanhood didn’t back off or froze in fear when verbally poked and prodded for more information, no she poked right back. She would make an interesting shogi partner for sure.

“Jiraiya, why don’t you give me your report.” Sarutobi turned to his former student who looked slightly irritated from him to Hisana.

“… Yes well, when I arrived in Fuku Gai the caravan had already been attacked,…” Jiraiya started to recount the events of the last few days.

The patriarch of the Sarutobi clan watched closely the reaction of the woman in front of him while Jiraiya talked. She flinched at a few parts of the story and her eyes glazed over as if she was somewhere else. No, it was irrevocably confirmed Yamaguchi Hisana was definitely no spy; he could give the all clear to Inoichi and Ibiki. Those two had been unable to find anything concrete on her other than her slightly questionable dealings with the black market concerning books. No, a spy wouldn’t have such a reaction to the report or would risk calling attention to herself with some dealings with the Black Market. Sarutobi was glad for that, he could see the affection Jiraiya seemed to hold for the younger woman, even if his white haired former student did do a good job at hiding them, he couldn’t fool his old sensei. To be honest, Hiruzen was a bit confused, he could see the affection clear as day but the level of the relationship between the two was still unclear to him, he would have to keep a closer eye on this.

“…, and that’s why I brought her here to give her version of the happenings since the massacre of the caravan.” Jiraiya ended.

The Hokage nodded while he inwardly frowned. Giving a report in Konoha? That wasn’t standard operation procedure, what was Jiraiya playing at??? His carefully arranged benevolent mask revealed through nothing his confusion or at least that was what he had thought until Hiruzen noticed the razor sharp gaze of the woman standing slightly behind Jiraiya, huh she had picked up on that? Remarkable for someone so young, especially a civilian, Yamaguchi Hisana was becoming more and more interesting with the minute. After all he had developed deception and his poker face to an art. The Sarutobi clan head had needed this skill to survive in his career as a ninja during the days when hidden villages sprung up everywhere in the Elemental countries. Though he had to admit that the moment he had become a politician he had found even more use in the tips and tricks that he had amassed throughout his life. The civilian council and other village leaders would have eaten him alive if he hadn’t had a perfect poker face throughout those meetings. That now such a youngster could at least partially see through it meant one of two things, either he was finally slipping in his old age or the woman in front of him had some of the best instincts he had ever encountered.

“Well I’m glad the kidnapping turned out alright for you Yamaguchi-san. I will inform one of the Chunins to take your statement and I would appreciate if you could make yourself available for more questions if the Interrogators find something.” the Sandaime voiced his thoughts.

“Yes Hokage-sama. Before I forget it, I overheard two of the bandits discussing their employer; they talked about an older man from Bird Country that had commissioned my kidnapping.” Hisana said firmly.

Was that irritation that Sarutobi picked up? The old man had to suppress his mirth. Well, well it seemed as if even an enigma like Yamaguchi Hisana wasn’t immune to curiosity and anger. His gut feeling was telling him that the woman in front of him was not someone who would let go of a grudge lightly. To be honest she reminded him a bit of Tsunade and Kushina, those two had always found a way to make their revenge exceedingly creative…, he would have to keep a close eye on this situation, if only for his own amusement.

“Well then, I wish you a nice stay in Konoha, I’m sure Jiraiya will take care of you.” Sarutobi added at the end, he just couldn’t help himself.

His humor must have shown through because the tiny answering smirk that he received from Hisana was telling. It seemed as if he wasn’t the only one that had picked up on Jiraiya strange mother hen vibes. Really,… this was the head of Konoha’s external spy network and he was acting like an overprotective father who feared for the virtue of his only daughter,… actually that didn’t seem to be so far off now that he thought about it,… but he would have to ponder his students strange relationship more thoroughly later, when he was not in the presence of this scary perceptive young woman.

Jiraiya and Hisana left the office after being dismissed, on the floor below the Fire Shadow’s office a slightly confused Chunin already waited for them. The man took Hisana’s statement before the odd pair left the tower and made their way to a hotel in the tourist section of Konoha.

After checking in and loading off her luggage, the Hisana and Jiraiya made their way to one of the white haired Sannin’s favorite sushi restaurants to talk and have some early lunch. They were seated and started to order drinks when Hisana finally addressed what she had noticed in the Hokage tower.

“I didn’t need to give my statement in Konoha did I?” Hisana asked in a wry tone.

There was a short embarrassed pause before Jiraiya answered slightly sheepish, “Not exactly.”

“You did this to finally get me to Konoha didn’t you?” the civilian woman’s voice was still unreadable.

Inwardly Hisana watched her fellow author’s chagrin with amusement, oddly enough she didn’t really mind that Jiraiya had manipulated her in this way. Yes this meeting could have been potentially disastrous for her but she knew that he didn’t have any malicious thoughts when he cajoled her into coming to Konoha.

“You have visited nearly every Shinobi village that exists in the Elementals and while you have crossed through Fire more than a handful times you never visited Konoha even once.” Jiraiya said in a strange tone of voice.

That may be true but in those villages she wasn’t more than an eccentric author with a book fetish, in Konoha her close contact with Jiraiya put her under a lot more scrutiny than anywhere else.

“Jiraiya,… are you pouting?” Hisana asked in a delighted voice, “,… you really are.”

Clear and warm sounding laugher broke out of her while she nudged the Sannin across from her with her elbow. Hisana didn’t even try to hide her mirth; this was a forty eight year old man that was acting like a two year old and to her great horror it was working!!!

“Well then, when are you giving me the grand tour of your Konoha?” the female author asked her elder friend after taking another sip of her tea.


	8. Chapter 8

Dead tired Hisana pealed her clothes off and stepped into the shower, it had been a very eventful day and she wasn’t sure if she liked in which direction her life seemed to head. Hisana shampooed her hair while she once more let the day pass in front of her inner eye.

After lunch they had spent the next few hours with Jiraiya leading her through the village and pointing out places that had historical or personal significance. Jiraiya regaled her with stories of his old Genin teams, both his own team as well as his students. Hisana noticed the bittersweet mood the white haired Sannin was in while he talked about the people that were clearly so dear to him and didn’t interrupt while he kept reminiscing about what he had lost.

Hisana herself was reminded of her life as Hermione and how she had lost so many good friends and comrades during the war. She knew that the loss would never fully go away but now that she saw how Jiraiya could talk about the good times that he had experienced with his fallen comrades she did feel some hope that some time in the future she would be able to let her mental barriers around Hermione’s memories down and think back on the good times without the overwhelming grief. She had already noticed that the emotional backlash was not as big anymore.   
In the last year she had found herself unconsciously thinking about what Harry and Ron would say to this or that or how excited Neville would have been about the different plants all around her, memories about her magical friends had slowly started to slip in between her day to day thoughts. This would have never been possible during the first year of her new life as Hisana, at that time those memory were airtight sealed in farthest corner of her mind, with time those seals had loosened and Hisana found herself not minding this occurrence as much as she would have thought.

When Jiraiya’s melancholic mood had passed, he was back to regaling her with hilarious stories about one ninja or the other. Hisana could only shake her head while she tried to catch her breath between all the laughing. If even a third of what Jiraiya had just told her was true she finally began to understand why almost everywhere in the Elemental Countries people sighed and started muttering about the eccentrics of the Fire country ninja.

In a nutshell, Hisana enjoyed herself immensely.

To be honest Konoha appealed to her the most of all the shinobi villages. It had a cheerful and open feeling to it and the stories just endeared it to her even more, some of them let her think about the Weasley twins as well as Luna, they would have fit right in here.   
The fact that you could find parks all across the village along with strong massive trees that grew alongside the roads was the icing on the cake. It reminded Hisana on of the small village her witch part had grown up in, as well as the Forbidden Forest and the Hogwarts grounds back in England and she felt instantly at home.

An hour before dinner time Jiraiya and Hisana were unexpectedly summoned back to the Hokage. When they arrived there Hisana couldn’t help but sent a curious glance at the tall, handsome blonde and the massive and slightly intimidating young man with the scars on his face that awaited them alongside Sarutobi.

Jiraiya stiffened beside her and he looked from the two men to the Hokage who had come around his desk to stand closer to them. Hisana made the instinctive observation that the Hokage was only a few centimeters taller than her.

“Yamaguchi-san, these are Yamanaka Inoichi and Morino Ibiki, they have a few questions concerning the kidnapping.” the Sandaime explained in a not unkind voice, a quick probe calmed Hisana down, he hadn’t any nefarious things planned for her.

Disregarding Jiraiya’s body language she gave a bow in the direction of the two men before she asked in a calm and collected voice, “How may I help you shinobi-sans?”

“Yamaguchi-san are you familiar with the name Hondura Hiroshi? This man was the one that had ordered your kidnapping.” Inoichi spoke while he watched the young woman in front of him, so this was the infamous Yamaguchi Hisana that had flashed Jiraiya? She certainly didn’t look like the type to do something like this.

The black haired woman stiffened and her eyes became cold. That little worm!!!

“Hondura Hiroshi you say?” Hisana nearly bit out.

Beside her Jiraiya’s eyebrows wandered into his hairline before he asked her somewhat hesitantly, “Isn’t that,…”.

“Yes.” the now furious black haired woman bit out before she took a deep breath and continued, “If you would excuse me Hokage-sama, Yamanaka-san, Morino-san, I have to inform my lawyer. I will sue this bastard out of every Ryo he ever made!”

Hisana was already turning around when Jiraiya caught her by her arm.

“I don’t think you should persecute him privately. If Konoha sends an official report it would go over a lot more smoothly.” Jiraiya explained.

The white haired man noticed the signs that generally announced that somebody was going to regret it severely to have crossed Yamaguchi Hisana and had to suppress a grin, somebody was clearly going down.

Still trying to calm herself Hisana turned to the Hokage to gauge what the old man would think about this.

Said Sarutobi inclined his head and said, “This would be a safer way to get your revenge Yamaguchi-san. Two of the caught renegades are from your home country and if we include your kidnapping in the official report this Hondura won’t be able to buy himself out of the charges.”

Hisana thought about this, it would mean less stressful paperwork for her and her lawyer. Seeing the clear advantage that lay with this solution the black haired woman agreed, after all she could extract her revenge in other ways then suing him out of his wealth and discredit him in front of his peers. She thanked the Hokage and excused herself; she would have to think this over more thoroughly.

While she made her way back to the hotel, Jiraiya decided to stay a bit longer and discuss some other topics concerning Konoha. He promised Hisana that he would collect her the next morning to continue the tour to which she readily agreed.

When the men were alone once more Jiraiya started to chuckle again, all four men had seen the gears turning behind Hisana’s eyes while she walked out of the office. The Sannin very nearly pitied that foolish man, Hisana’s wrath tended to be humiliating and painful for ones pride, she loved to play mind games after all.

After calming down his mirth the white haired Sannin told his fellow shinobi more about the would-be-kidnapper, “Hondura was Hisana’s publisher until eight weeks ago when she refused to extend her contract with him. That man really has no idea what a can of worms he has just opened; Hisana is going to make his life as miserable as possible. I think it would be far kinder to just lock him up and throw the key away.”

“Why would you say that? And didn’t she just agree to let Konoha handle the situation?” Inoichi asked slightly irritated.

Nothing in the reports that he had received had even implied with one word that Yamaguchi Hisana could be forceful, quite the opposite in fact. From the information he had gathered and analyzed Inoichi had believed that she had more of a cool temperament, even bordering on Hyuuga-freezing.

“You haven’t had regular contact with her like me and her public behavior is only a small part of her true personality, Hisana is a lot more complex than that. I know that she comes off as aloof and cool and that’s also true in most instances. There isn’t much that ignites her ire but once you have pissed her off she has a downright sadistic streak. Believe me Ibiki; I’m sure you would have enjoyed some of the stuff she had pulled throughout the years; mind games are a personal favorite of hers. And concerning her interfering with Konoha, don’t worry she is too smart to do that. She will let Konoha start the investigation and then after the sentence is decided she will extract her revenge.”

The men in the Hokage’s office thought over this new piece of information, Ibiki especially was now interested; he would have to find a way to get more information about Hisana’s prior revenges out of Jiraiya or even the woman herself, there weren’t a lot of people he and Inoichi could compare notes with.

The Hokage on the other hand just nodded to himself, what Jiraiya said definitely fit with what he had gleaned off of his encounter with Yamaguchi-san. That the woman seemed to have a weakness for mind games, puzzles and knowledge wasn’t so implausible,… oh and Jiraiya,… he hadn’t missed that warm and fond smile she had given him when they left his office, such emotions were nearly impossible to fake.   
Furthermore the reports that he had received from Jiraiya painted a, maybe a bit biased, but still rather frightening picture of her mental capabilities. His innate curiosity and instincts urged him to keep her in Konoha so that he could figure her out and maybe develop and make use of this talent in some way.   
With the right amount of positive reinforcement they would most likely be able to secure her loyalty for Konoha. She would be an interesting asset to the Hidden Village in the Leaves, no doubt, be it through the popularity of her books that would bring tax income or the potential of her intelligence.   
After all the aptitude of intelligence could be bred, as the Nara clan and to a lesser extend the Hyuuga clan kept demonstrating. If even one of Yamaguchi-san’s children inherited her mothers’ mental capabilities it would pay off in the long run for the village.

The Hokage kept playing with this thought while he changed the topic of the discussion to the latest political moves of the Tsuchikage and what that would mean for Konoha.

Meanwhile Hisana arrived at her hotel room where she sank on the bed and stared up at the ceiling. Great, fantastic, she should have seen this coming. When in doubt hire thugs or ninja, seemed to be the concept of the Elemental countries.   
Sighing tiredly the black haired woman rubbed her eyes; she should have known that Hondura wouldn’t take her refusal standing like this. She was kicking herself for discounting him as annoying but harmless, even the smallest worm could become dangerous when he had the right amount of money and motivation.

She seriously needed an attitude adjustment concerning her life and safety, for too long she had handled things like she would have in her old life as Hermione. Back then she had magic at her disposal and could defend herself when needed, furthermore her biggest opponent during that time was another civilian that had maybe more experience than her but approximately the same speed. Contrary to this she was set against ninja here in the Elemental Countries, _professional_ mercenaries who definitely were faster and stronger than her and most importantly did that for a living!

She stood no chance against that not anymore, probably not even during the time she had been able to use magic; the kidnapping had finally driven this fact home and Hisana was ready to make some adjustments.

She was a civilian, helpless against even the lowest Genin, and her status as known and wealthy author made her an even bigger target. Now that she thought about it, her status as belonging to a publisher was probably what had kept others from hiring ninja to kidnap her and exploit her talent or wealth, but now that she was ‘free’ again, she was fair game to all of them.  
Hisana was kicking herself over her own stupidity; she would have to find a way to discourage any ninja from trying to kidnap her and that fast or she would have to constantly watch her back from now on.

Sighing and massaging her aching shoulders Hisana wandered into the bathroom to take a shower. These damn thoughts had given her a pressure headache.


End file.
